Fifty Shades of Grey joins list of classics including Catcher in the Rye which have been challenged in schools and libraries

As America’s annual celebration of the right to read prepares to kick off on Sunday, EL James’s erotic sensation Fifty Shades of Grey joins a list of classics including Catcher in the Rye and Fahrenheit 451 which have been challenged in libraries and schools.

Banned Books Week, which celebrates its 30th anniversary this year, will be marked with displays of censored literature in thousands of libraries and bookshops across the US from 30 September. There will be a “virtual read-out“, where readers and authors name their favourite censored titles, a “50 Shades of Banned” reading of erotic literature in Manhattan, courtesy of the National Coalition Against Censorship and the Comic Book Legal Defence Fund, and the American Library Association has named a series of titles challenged or censored over the past 30 years, from Catcher in the Rye to the Harry Potter series.